FIRST DAY OF SUMMER AND IMPORTANT LESSON

This post originally appeared on this blog the summer of 2013.  In three days I head out for vacation and am trying to take the advice in its words, so I thought I'd repost it for you. = STEVE

 

BY STEVE DUNN

"First day of Summer supper: Hot dogs, corn on the cob, and sliced tomatoes!!!"

This is what my friend Kay Royer Cocklin posted on her Facebook page yesterday afternoon.  My first response was, "Oh! Yes!!!!!" Made me sad that I had already eaten a bowl of cereal for supper. (My wife is out of town being a grandmother-in-residence and I was too tired after mowing to get very creative.)

Simple things--hot dogs, corn on the cob, sliced tomatoes.  Readily accessible to most of us in America. Better than most things you would have popped into a microwave.  A whole lot cheaper than a steak. Except maybe for the hot dogs, a whole lot healthier, too.

Simple pleasures that those of us who have experienced them--quite satisfying.

Choosing the simple and taking pleasure from it tends to be a counter-cultural concept in 21st century America. Smart phones, smart cars, smart houses, constant digital connection, designer clothes, beds with dual comfort controls, specially manufactured golf clubs, 200 channels of satellite TV--the list goes on and grows more complicated by the second.

And so often those things carry complications that drain the last ounce of simplicity from our lives and replace it anxiety and aggravation.  Ever try to talk to cable company computer?  What happens when your smart car enters a dumb phase?  How much will it cost you to fix it? Do you really have to be available to every human being via phone every moment of your day?  Do the manufactured clubs feel any better when you miss the put or shank the drive?  Do you ever stop working to pay for your smart home long enough to actually be in it?

Don't all the options of life at times just get overwhelming?  Don't you simply run so much that you find yourself in a rat race where the rats are winning?

Don't say "no" because I know you're lying - to yourself as well as me.

Donald Miller writes:  "It is always the simple things that change our lives. And these things never happen when you are looking for them to happen.  Life will reveal answers at the pace life wishes to do so. You feel like running, but life is a stroll.  This is how God does things."

I pretty much missed the first day of summer because I let myself embrace the complicated.  I put too many things in my schedule.  I didn't stop to savor the sunshine or read a good book.  In fact, I didn't even look at the calendar to notice that it was the first day of summer.  Ironically, it was my sabbath, my day of rest and refreshment and instead I filled it with the things that I hadn't gotten done on my work days.

And I forgot the hot dogs, corn on the cob, and sliced tomatoes.  Didn't pay much attention to God either.

My loss.

(C) 2103 by Stephen Dunn

Permission is given to repost or quote provided this copyright notice is included and a link provided to this blogsite.  The courtesy of an email with a link to its reposting or a copy of the work it is quoted in would be appreciated.

A HUMOROUS TRIBUTE TO FATHERS

Remember, God has a sense of hunor

Who does she think she's fooling?

This one is far too true

I know some Dads who could use this

SATURDAY IS FOR CHURCH SIGNS

You'll love this batch -- or hate it if it's too close to home.

I AM TIRED

By Steve Dunn

Watching the news lately, I have grown tired, very tired.  I am tired of ….

Politicians who demonize people and political positions with which they disagree.

Politicians who spin or even ignore the truth that is inconvenient to them but who insist on

  accountability and even punishment for others who do the same.

Politicians who believe that they are above the need for civility and respect towards others.

Politicians who demand absolute conformity and support from people who work for them even

   when they are wrong.

Politicians who put their mouth in motion before their mind is in gear.

Politicians who don’t know when to simply keep their thoughts to themselves

Politicians who worship political correctness but who believe people who do not agree with

   their definition should ostracized.

Politicians who believe that character is a private matter.

Politicians who do not know how to choose their battles.

Politicians who believe people should never question their motives or integrity.

Politicians who believe they are always right.

Political supporters who support these “leaders” unquestioningly and pounce on those who dare to question their pet politician.

Political supporters who always assume the other side is lying. 

Political supporters who justify these actions by saying the other side does it, too.

Neither these political leaders nor their uncritical supporters do our nation a service.

    

BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT

This post originally appeared in a blog I no longer publish, THE ROAD TO JOY

 

BY STEVE DUNN

“… be filled with the Holy Spirit.” – Ephesians 5:18a

      We often make statements that to others appear as self-deluding.  When I was growing up, such statements were greeted with the comment, “You are full of it.” (We will have to stop there because the etymology of that expression refers to something very nasty that you are full of.) But for Christians, being full of something refers to being filled with the Holy Spirit of God.

     Some Christian groups use this command as a code word for a specific kind of religious experience or as a litmus test of a certain type of Christianity that they believe to be superior to all other forms of Christianity.  I tend to disagree with both usages but that is a theological issue beyond the scope of what I want to say today

     We fill our lives with many things — jobs, family, and even religion.  All in pursuit of happiness or fulfillment or meaning.  But those things are often delusions because they are expressions of a delusional belief that say, “It’s all about me.”  For too many our highest aim is self-satisfaction not significance.  We believe our lives have meaning when we get to be who we want to be.

     Such an attitude ultimately requires us  to ignore our neighbor, be indifferent to our community, and abandon any true responsibility for our world.

      The one true antidote to this outcome is not saturate our lives with self but to let the Spirit indwell us shaping us and empowering us to be people whose lives are immeasurably and whose impact brings God’s wholeness to all.

(C) 2014 by Stephen L Dunn

PENTECOST SUNDAY

BY STEVE DUNN

Nineteen hundred and eighty-four years ago a new living organism was born on Planet Earth.  It's name?  The Church!  Fifty days after the Resurrection, the disciples of Jesus Christ and about 120 other Christ-followers were gathered together in an upper room in Jerusalem earnestly in prayer and waiting in expectation for the arrival of the Comforter Jesus had promised them in another room on the night before Passover, the night before He would go to the Cross for the sins of the world.

Jews from all over the known world were also gathered in Jerusalem, cramming homes and inns, for a very special celebration called Pentecost.  For the Jewish people, Pentecost was the feast where they celebrated the giving of the law on Mount Sinai,  a fest that took its name from the fact that the events on Mt. Sinai occurred 50 days after the Exodus of the Jewish slaves from Egypt.

That day the Holy Spirit showed up (see Acts 2 and 3), baptizing those disciples with fire in a event whose accompanied by the deafening sound like a mighty, violent wind.  When the wind subsided, these disciples poured out into the streets and all of Jerusalem witnessed a miracle--what Lloyd Olgilvie calls "the miracle of communication" as they began speaking not in their native tongue of Galilee but in the languages of those who had gathered in that teeming city and each person heard the Word of God in their own language.  Not a unknown glossolalia but a miraculous and instantly recognizable xenolalia.

At first the skeptics, seeing "unlearned" men from Galilee, thought they were drunk but Peter answered them with the first Christian sermon that led to 3000 persons joining that new Church in the day of its birth.

This is what Christians all over the world celebrate today.  Churches and altars and people decorated red--the color of the Holy Spirit's fire will gather and praise God for the birth and the power and the purpose given them on that day.  Although many people today despise that church and although it has not always lived up to its identity, millions and billions of lives of this planet have found healing and hope, salvation and peace because this organism has been alive and at work on this planet.

On this day, the church humbly repents when its humanity has drawn it away from the Spirit, but unashamedly confesses that Jesus is Lord and the Church is His Body.

© 2017 by Stephen L. Dunn. Permission is given to repost or quote provided this copyright notice is included and a link provided to this blogsite or to drstevedunn.com The courtesy of an email with a link to its reposting or a copy of the work it is quoted in would be appreciated.